


Petals

by writergirl8



Series: Shirbert Drabbles [1]
Category: Anne of Green Gables - L. M. Montgomery, Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Flower Crowns, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:01:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24273220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writergirl8/pseuds/writergirl8
Summary: This place, this bed, thispersonis her new home. The wide window that looks out over an early sunrise and neatly kept yard, the soft sheets that Marilla had helped her sew, the deep, even breaths next to her are all hers to keep now. She sits up so quickly she almost hits her head on the headboard and finally allows herself to look over at her sleeping husband.
Relationships: Gilbert Blythe/Anne Shirley
Series: Shirbert Drabbles [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1752193
Comments: 42
Kudos: 295
Collections: anne with an e





	Petals

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MamiRugbee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MamiRugbee/gifts).



> Inspired by a piece of art that Jenni (MamiRugbee) shared with me last night. There is no point to this, I just love fluff. I'm writergirl8 on twitter if you want to in-depth analyze every one of Gilbert Blythe's poorest choices (and his best ones).

Since becoming a farmer’s daughter, Anne has grown accustomed to waking with the sun. She’s spent many mornings greeting the opened up sky from her bedroom window, taking in the tableau of her beloved Green Gables, before stumbling back to bed and falling back asleep amongst her cozy covers, only to be woken up a short while after by Marilla’s stern, commanding voice. 

This morning, however, when the sun wakes up, it is not accompanied by a rooster or the sound of heavy boots clomping down the stairs. It is the silence, not the light, that causes Anne’s eyes to flutter open, taking in a ceiling that is unfamiliar to her. 

Anne may be accustomed to waking with the sun, but she isn’t accustomed to waking up in strange places, and she certainly isn’t used to waking up _next_ to someone. 

It rushes back to her in a storm of joy, ripping violently through her until she is clutching at the throat of her nightgown, trying to contain the elated hurricane in her heart. 

This place, this bed, this _person_ is her new home. The wide window that looks out over an early sunrise and neatly kept yard, the soft sheets that Marilla had helped her sew, the deep, even breaths next to her are all hers to keep now. She sits up so quickly she almost hits her head on the headboard and finally allows herself to look over at her sleeping husband. 

He sleeps on his back, she sees, and from underneath where she has peeled off the covers, she’s able to see that the hem of his white shirt has ridden up in sleep. His hair is messy across the pillow, a sight to behold, and all she wants to do is smooth down the strands and then muss them up all over again. Anne reaches behind her head and realizes that she hadn’t bothered to braid her hair back last night. It must be a mess, with the way Gilbert had wrapped his fingers around it and guided her mouth to his so sweetly, so lovingly, that she had felt it all the way down in her knees. 

She inches closer on her elbows, feeling for the first time in her life that she doesn’t have to ignore the ache of curiosity that she feels for him. They’ve had to spend their lives looking away when all they wanted to do is stare, but there’s no one else in this entire house to stop them, to tell them to get out of bed, to tell them to be proper. And, more than that, there’s no _need_ to be proper. In fact, they can be whatever they want. 

Determinedly, Anne decides that she’s going to study. 

She studies his freckles, the jut of his collarbone, the sweep of his eyelashes across his skin. She runs her finger across his bottom lip, tugging lightly, and is about to move down to his chin before her eyes catch something else in his hair. Flower petals from the crowns that they had worn last night. She’d been so caught up in wedding preparations that she hadn’t had time to do everything she wanted to, but when they got back to Green Gables from the church, Gilbert had presented her with a flower crown and had produced a second one for himself, a self-satisfied smirk crossing his lips. She’d taught him how to create them back when they’d first begun to court, laughing at his fumbling fingers, never quite knowing if they were from uncertainty in the project or nerves from being around her. These crowns had been some of his best work, however, and she wonders now if he had practiced to get them just right. It’s so mindful, so caring, that she can’t help but press a kiss against Gilbert’s mouth. 

Careful not to wake him, Anne climbs over Gilbert and settles herself on his stomach. There, she carefully begins to pluck the stray petals out of his curls, looming low against him just because she wants to be touching him in as many places possible. 

Their friends had thrown petals at them as they hugged them goodbye, and as their night had continued, the crowns had seemed to blend into everything else in the evening, warm and colorful and soft as petals. She thinks about how exhausted they must have been to forget about the flower crowns, to forget to take them off. Then Gilbert shifts in his sleep and she realizes that, just maybe, it was less about the exhaustion and more that they couldn’t be bothered to see anything but each other. 

A light laugh bubbles up from her stomach. She bites her lip and continues to pick tiny petals out of her husband’s hair, delirious with the absurd reality of it all. Under her, Gilbert’s eyebrows contract very suddenly. He opens one eye, squinting up at her, his cheek scrunching up towards the other eye as he stares. 

“Good morning,” he says plainly, like this happened every day. His voice is rough with sleep. Anne half thinks that he thinks he’s dreaming. 

“Good morning,” she responds, pressing her lips to his briefly to remind him that all of this is real. 

Her kiss seems to wake Gilbert to reality. He’s up in a shot, his hands scooping her body against his as he flips them over so that Anne is back against the pillows, cradled against his body as he hovers over her. 

“Good _morning_ ,” he says again, more awake this time, which makes Anne laugh. He catches her laughter on his lips, then pulls back to study her face just as she had been studying him. 

“No one to stop us,” she says for him, and he nods wonderingly as he runs his fingers from her ear to her throat, causing Anne to shiver involuntarily. It makes Gilbert break out into his biggest smile, the one that almost exclusively belongs to her, and he begins to pepper her face with insistent kisses, still cradling her body against his. Anne decides to meet him halfway, wrapping her legs around his waist and sinking into the pillows, her hand on the back of his neck as he presses his lips against every part of her face he can reach. Finally, he places both of his hands on her cheeks and kisses her in earnest on the mouth, thumbs creating pathways in her freckles. She knows with a certainty that she feels in her bones that his hands will find these exact paths on her body over and over again, that his lips will always nudge so warmly against hers, that she will never forget the way a flower falls out of his hair and onto her forehead, causing both of them to break into laughter. 

“We could stay here all day,” Gilbert suggests, voice muffled against her skin as he kisses her neck. Anne runs her hand between his shoulder blades and smiles when she feels him shiver against her. She likes him here, between her legs, somehow vulnerable to her despite the fact that she is lying underneath him. 

“I wasn’t aware there was an alternate plan,” she replies nonchalantly. “We _may_ need to eat something at some point.”

“Hmmm.” Gilbert kneels in front of her in bed, staring down at her for a moment, sloppy smile on his sweet, wonderful face. He hitches her knees up higher so that she slides lower in the bed, _their_ bed, and tilts his head to the side as though plotting a point for attack. “Let’s make it a low priority, yeah?”

His eyes catch the way her hair is spread out across the pillow and she watches as he swallows, hard, before reaching out to remove some of the petals that still adorn her hair. He gets to work, slowly, steadily picking them out until he finally works his way down to the ends of her hair, pressing a kiss against the crook of her elbow before sliding back up on the bed. 

She’s still beaming as he covers her with his warmth and shows her exactly what his top priority is and always will be. 


End file.
